Traditional Urban Theory Research Articles

“It’s Karachi, Its, Where Life and Love Come to Die”: Representing Gender, Space and Identity in Karachi You are Killing Me

This paper demonstrates that Saba Imtiaz’s Karachi You Are Killing Me, re-conceptualizes the relationship between urban spaces and female bodies. The traditional urban theories define space as unchangeable physical reality that profoundly affects its inhabitants. Feminist urban theorists question the traditional gendered perspective on both space and corporeality. Drawing on Elizabeth Grosz (1998) concept on bodies cities, I will investigate how woman as being both spectator and spectacle renegotiates her identity within the patriarchal urban spaces. This research argues that Grosz’s (1998) concept of Bodies-cities is an important intervention in our understanding of spatial politics in postcolonial spaces, as it discusses how female bodies play an important role in the formation of urban corporeality. Her seminal feminist work invents a new insight into the city-body nexus that also helps to address issues such as gender discrimination, inequalities, and urban violence.

Religiöser metropolitaner Mainstream.

Contrary to assumptions in traditional urban theory that understand religion as external or peripheral to urban modernity, cities have by no means been secularized over the course of the rapid global urbanization processes of recent decades. Instead, the much discussed return of religion in the public sphere is primarily an urban phenomenon. At a global level, metropolises have become laboratories and arenas for new religious phenomena exercising a huge influence on urban spaces, cultures and societies. Current research in various world regions shows that religion does not represent some exotic reminiscence. Rather, its agency unfolds at the heart of contemporary metropolitan modernization. Based on the results of case studies that the transregional research project “Global Prayers – Redemption and Liberation in the City” has conducted in cities like Berlin, Istanbul, Lagos and Rio de Janeiro, the paper argues that the religious appears to be expanding in all other areas of the production of the urban in such a manner that it is increasingly difficult to say where religion stops, and where it begins. It shows how urban religions, generally interpreted as reactions to social relocations caused by global neoliberalism, can as well be understood as driving forces of contemporary urban capitalism itself.

Explaining Crime in Metropolitan and Non-Metropolitan Communities

Traditional urban theories of community crime development increasingly are being adapted and evaluated for their relevance to the crime problems of smaller and less urban settings. Most notable of these have been social disorganization theory and civic community theory. This paper compares these two major theoretical frameworks for explaining community-level variations in crime, using county-level data on crime rates merged with data on the economic, geographic, population, and ecological features of counties in the U.S. The study finds that both traditional social disorganization and civic community theories are good predictors of some, but not all, types of crime, in the largest metropolitan areas. However, their predictive power declines substantially when applied to the most rural communities.

Downtown, Uptown, Out of Town

In a recentNew York Timesarticle, Robert Sharoff reported on “a throwback to the early years of the 20th century when wealthy Chicago families tended to live in such close-in neighborhoods as Prairie Avenue and theGold Coast.” For the past five years, wealthy Chicagoans have been constructing “palatial residences of at least 6,000 square feet” in the Lincoln Park neighborhood a mile and one-half north of the Loop (Sharoff 2000: 36). This “return” of the well-to-do to the city contradicts traditional urban theories on elite residential patterns; the preponderance of these theories projects the upper class universally and continuously seeking the metropolitan fringe for new homes, more and open land, and/or lower density (Burgess 1925; Hoyt 1939; Alonso 1964; Adams 1987; Downs 1981; Luger 1996; Lowry 1960; Hartshorn and Muller 1989; and Knox 1994).These theories, as well as the notion of the recent return of the upper class to the city, mask a long history of continuing elite residence within some cities as well as considerable diversity in upper-class residence patterns and landscapes among cities.

McKenzie, Dennis J., and Betts, Richard M., Essentials of Real Estate Economics, Fourth Edition

McKenzie, Dennis J., and Betts, Richard M., Essentials of Real Estate Economics, Fourth Edition, Prentice-Hall, 1996. 470 pages. Current real estate literature has reached the stage where empirical estimates need to be interpreted within a coherent theoretical structure. Unfortunately, many practitioners lack theoretical backgrounds, especially in economic theory. Their experience and empirical knowledge would have greater impact in our literature if they would link it to traditional theory. The latest (completely rewritten) edition of Essentials of Real Estate Economics by Dennis J. McKenzie and Richard M. Betts will help them achieve this. It contains lucid descriptions of the comprehensive set of economic and financial theories most useful in real estate analysis, even to readers who are new to both subjects. It will therefore serve both as a basic text and reference book. The work is composed of four parts. The first two parts focus on the traditional urban theories. In the second half of the text, the authors present an economic view of real estate development and investment, subjects that generally appear only in finance and real estate texts. A primer on economic principles in presented on part one. The basic ideas in both micro and macroeconomics that students need to understand real estate applications are set forth. A sequence of chapters describes the Federal Reserve System and how the regulation of interest rates affects real estate markets. The unit concludes with a comparison between general theoretical and actual real estate markets. The general theory is extended to include this unique imperfect type of market. This first part is a great introduction to real estate for economists and provides a concise review of economics for those who were primarily trained in other disciplines. Part II develops the traditional urban subjects: community development, growth, and land use patterns. This unit is organized by the various types of land use: residential housing, commercial, industrial, rural, and recreational. The economic factors that determine values in each sector are carefully described. In addition, a range of topics from employment growth to transportation theory and spatial location is developed to explain urban growth. The effects of neighborhood preservation and governmental housing programs on metropolitan and suburban growth patterns are also considered. This second part is a concise, well-organized presentation of urban economics. It includes an appropriate balance of national, regional, and local neighborhood issues. …

Organisational and Technological Change and the Future Role of the Central Business District: an Australian Example

A critical re-examination of traditional urban theory concerning central area office and retail activities suggests that an appreciation of dynamic organisational and technological processes may be missing from the planner's insights into causes of change in the Central Business District. This paper reviews some Australian evidence concerning organisational and technological change, and shows that these processes are already impinging upon the Central Business District of Melbourne, Australia. A more general conclusion emerges, which is that rather than focus upon issues such as urban rent and accessibility of central areas, analysis should now pay greater attention to understanding those processes operating within the Central Business District which originate from the dynamics of larger environments.

Changes in unemployment differentials in Sydney, 1947–76

This paper describes the historical development of spatial patterns of male and female unemployment rates within Sydney at each census year from 1947 to 1976, with two objectives: firstly to review the predictions of traditional urban theory that unemployment will be high in inner city areas because of the workforce characteristics of the residents; secondly, to assess the impact of the decentralisation of firms.

Evidence of Central City Revival

Abstract There has been much discussion concerning the likelihood of middle- and upper-income groups choosing to locate near the centers of United States cities. One may find case studies documenting the rejuvenation of central city neighborhoods with a discussion of the factors that tended to bring this rejuvenation about. However, there has been little attempt to integrate this rejuvenation with traditional urban theory. In addition, there has been almost no research that looks at more than a few cities and uses comparable measures that tries to formulate and evaluate a theory of central city residential revival. This article is a step in that direction. It summarizes the author's research in center city revival. Twenty of the largest United States cities were studied to see if there was any positive change in the number of census tracts with middle- and upper-income families living within two miles of the CBD during the 1960s. It was found that a number of the cities did show an increase in the number of such tracts. An analysis of the causal factors follows. Upon completion of this analysis, it was concluded that the centers of the nation's largest cities are not destined for decay but in fact hold potential as the sites of middle- and upper-income neighborhoods.